


Beautiful

by Vee



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:41:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vee/pseuds/Vee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short and sweet high school era AoKise... a still-unspoken bond. Because boys are dumb (okay, certain boys)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beautiful

There’s a peculiar armistice – and it’s probably an unconscious one – in the way he listens when you talk. Like living in the outside world is an act of violence for him, a drive for competition combining with a social anxiety he will never admit to until you invade his aegis, grab him around the waist, say his name, add a flourish. He shakes you off and chastises you, but everything gives the slightest bit from that point forward. He doesn’t like it when people make him explain things or say what he’s thinking – not until he’s good and ready, with his thoughts all carefully packaged and mentally practiced – so he likes it when you prattle on. You tend to; you know this. But no one else appreciates it. Not the way he does. He doesn’t appreciate it because he thinks you’re brilliant or you have jarring insights into whatever random thing you happen to be focusing on. He appreciates it because he needs it. It’s a reprieve, a salve on being the center of attention under most of his chosen social circumstances. You’re a complement, and it’s a beautiful thing to be.

“I wish I was beautiful,” he says off-handedly, non sequitur of the current topic as he touches your hair.

You’re stunned for a moment, and swallow thickly to get your wits. It’s not necessarily about you, but somehow you just _know_. It’s the first time he’s called you beautiful, in his own roundabout way. You sit up a little bit, pull your head up off his thigh where you’re tucked back, legs spread out and enjoying the sun and his closeness. “What?”

“Nothing, it’d just be nice for people to like me for something else, is all.” He’s brooding. You relax back into position and take a deep breath.

“Something other than basketball?”

“Something other than… being the way I am.”

“You’re not that way, though,” you say, feeling one of your sporadic bursts of poignancy take over. “I like who you are now. And I like who you used to be. They’re getting there. They’re getting to be the same again.”

He’s quiet for a few moments. His fingers are still in your hair. It feels good.

“Yeah.” Then, with a sigh: “It feels like I’ve known you longer.”

“Longer than what? Than who?”

“Longer than I have.”

“Yeah.” You can’t help the smile; it’s a slow and contented one, and you’re so surprised to feel _happy_ that it takes some time to surrender to it. “I know what you mean.”

You feel nervous. A spark of intuition lights in your stomach and curls through your senses, tightening your throat and burning your sinuses for a moment. You know something’s about to happen. The silence has been too long, and too important. His fingers slow thoughtfully on the back of your neck.

“Kise…” he starts.

It’s all you can do to keep from losing your breath. “Aominecchi?”

“After high school, will you… um…” It’s like reality comes back to him all at once. He doesn’t say it but he feels like it. The spark is extinguished inside of you as you feel him deflate in the face of it. “You know, never mind.”

“It’s okay.”

He doesn’t bristle and he doesn’t ask you why it wouldn’t be okay. Because he knows there’s going to be another chance to get his nerve up, another chance to take advantage of a sunset on a lazy afternoon and say what you both already know. He’s horrible at this. You just keep giving him chances, because he needs every single one of them. Some things don’t come as naturally to the gifted.

 “Tell me more about that drama you’re watching. You were on about it before I interrupted.”

His fingers are still on the back of your neck. They never moved. 


End file.
